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You'll Hear It

"Music of My Mind" – Stevie Wonder

3/2/20261 hr 39 min

What happens when you let a musical genius make the album of his dreams? You get Stevie Wonder's Music of My Mind (1972), the start of the greatest run in music history. 

Music of My Mind would be the first of a five-album run that formed Stevie Wonder's Classic Period, including Talking Book (1972), Innervisions (1973), Fulfillingness' First Finale (1974) and Songs in the Key of Life (1976).

In this episode of You'll Hear It, jazz pianists Adam Maness and Peter Martin dive into every track on Music of My Mind, listening to isolated stems and breaking down the theory b...

Clips

Defining Stevie’s Classic Period
Meeting Tonto, Changing History
Seventeen Songs, One Weekend
The Single That Wasn’t
Why ‘Evil’ Is Desert-Island
Stevie’s Secret Harmonic Weapon

Transcript preview

First 90 seconds

  1. Peter Martin· Host0:01

    [upbeat music] May 13th, 1971, Stevie Wonder turns 21 years old, and his Motown contract expires on the spot. For the first time in his life, he's free. No more producers telling him what to play, no more Motown foreign lists. Two weeks later, he shows up unannounced at a studio in New York, knocks on the door, and asks to meet a 1,000-pound synthesizer named Tonto. He proceeds to play everything himself, drums, keys, bass, harmonica, vocals, all Stevie. The back of this album literally reads, "This album is virtually the work of one man." This is Music of My Mind, and Stevie Wonder is finally free to fly.

  2. Stevie Wonder· Soundbite0:39

    Every day I wanna fly my kite. And every day I wanna fly my kite. And every day I wanna get on my camel and ride. Ooh, girl.

  3. Adam Maness· Host0:55

    I'm Adam Menace.

  4. Peter Martin· Host0:57

    And I'm Peter Martin.

  5. Adam Maness· Host0:58

    And you're listening to the You'll Hear It podcast.

  6. Peter Martin· Host1:00

    Music explored.

  7. Adam Maness· Host1:01

    Explored. Brought to you today by Open Studio. Go to openstudiojazz.com for all your jazz lessons needs. Peter, we're exploring like crazy today.

  8. Peter Martin· Host1:08

    Oh, my goodness.

  9. Adam Maness· Host1:09

    We're gonna explore the hell out of this record. Steve- Hails, yeah. [laughs] [laughs] Yeah, Stevie Wonder's 1972 Music of My Mind. It feels like, and I know it's not, I know at this point he'd made 14 albums before this one.

  10. Peter Martin· Host1:24

    Yeah.

  11. Adam Maness· Host1:25

    But it feels new.

  12. Peter Martin· Host1:26

    Right.

  13. Adam Maness· Host1:26

    It feels like the start, it feels like a, an emerging artist somehow, even though

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